atch you, and warn him the moment they suspect
you of being on the right scent. Whereas I am nobody. Miste does not
even know me. I wish I knew him."

And I remembered with regret how ignorant I was.

"Besides," I added, "you surely have other calls. The Vicomte requires
some one near him--the ladies will be glad of your advice and
assistance."

He was scarcely the man to whom I should have applied for either, but
one can never tell with women. Some of them look up to us when we know
in our hearts that we are no better than asses.

We talked of details which may well be omitted here, for the majority
of them were based upon assumptions subsequently to be proved
erroneous. It seemed that Alphonse Giraud had almost given up hope of
recovering his lost wealth, and as I raised this anew in his breast so
his face grew graver. A great hope makes a grave face.

"You must not," he said, "make me believe that, unless you have a good
foundation for your own faith."

"Oh, no!" I answered, and instinctively changed the subject. His
gravity disturbed me.

But he returned to his thought again and again.

"It is not the money," he said at length, when I, who knew what was
coming, could no longer hold him. "It is--" he paused, his face
suddenly red as he looked hard into his coffee-cup. "It is Lucille."

I made no answer, and it was Alphonse who spoke again, after a pause.

"What a hard face you have, mon ami!" he said. "I never noticed it
before. I pity that poor Miste, you know--if you catch him."

The same evening I spoke to my old patron, whom I found in the
morning-room, where he sat alone and in meditation. The doors of his
own study were still locked, and no one was allowed to enter there.
His manner was so feverish and unnatural that I almost abandoned my
project of leaving the Rue des Palmiers.

"Ah!" he said, "what a terrible day--and that poor Alphonse! How did
you leave him?"

I thought of Alphonse as I had left him, smiling under his mourning
hat-band, waving a black glove gaily to me in farewell.

"Oh," I answered, "Alphonse will soon be himself again."

"Ah, my friend," exclaimed the Vicomte, after a sorrowful pause. "The
surprises of life are all unpleasant. Pfuit!" he spread out his hands
suddenly as if indicating a quick flight, "and I lose a friend and
four hundred thousand francs in the twinkling of an eye. To think that
a mere shock can kill a man as it killed the poor Baron."

"He had no neck,